The green paint looks sadWell it's time for a new coat of paint. Rather than the green colour scheme which was badly oxidising, I decided to go for something a little more bold. I had a contemporary colour scheme in mind.

Wow, choosing a colour scheme is HARD!!! You end up looking at millions of other boats and once you have found something you like, you realise that they won't translate to your boat because the shape is different, or perhaps you didn't quite like the shade, and so on. Looking at colour swatches is OK, but what will the colour look like on a whole boat?

Initially I wanted to copy a colour scheme from another boat, but came to the conclusion that the colour scheme which worked well with a boat with portholes wouldn't translate onto our boat because of the deep windows not allowing sufficient border and a dark coloured centre panel highlighting the fact that the windows are not symetrically placed top and bottom.

I knew I wanted something different, so eventually I decided on Black with Salmon lines and roof.

I had found a Salmon colour of the Dulux colour chart. The Masons paint was provided by Sayers in Northampton who did a brilliant job of matching the colour.

Trevor starts to apply the salmon on the name panelIn order to reduce the cost, I did most of the preparation and about half the painting together with Trevor, the resident boat painter. I can see why boats are expensive to paint!

The preparation took 2 weeks of working rather more than 8 hours a day, and the painting another week.

This picture shows Trevor starting to apply the salmon cover over the undercoat.

more of TrevorHere she is looking rather forlorne with the green heavily sanded back and the salmon colour starting to be applied.

The signwriting goes onRuss starts on the signwriting - and Elizabeth Jane starts to look whole again!

Russ did the original signwriting. In addition to narrowboats he also paints fairground rides and anything else that needs the touch of a skilled old fashioned signwriter.

The signwriting took just under 2 days to complete. And boy does it look good.